Militarized neighborhood search alarms neighbors

Police and prosecutors are cracking down on gun violence with neighborhood searches, tougher sentencing for gun possession crimes, and prevention and intervention measures.

Charlottesville and Albemarle County police use an armored vehicle and heavily armed officers to execute multiple search warrants in the Westhaven neighborhood in the early morning hours on June 17.

While you probably won't see photos like this on the Charlottesville Police Department’s social media pages, this is what residents of Westhaven woke up to Tuesday morning last week — an armored vehicle with a heavily armed officer in the turret being used to execute multiple search warrants in connection with shooting investigations.

Both CBS19 and 29News reported on the June 17 joint operation between the Charlottesville and Albemarle County police departments, but those reports didn’t include images of an armored vehicle.

The above image was posted by activist Tanesha Hudson, who expressed concern on social media about the militarized approach to executing s…